SCAMM'ONY. JALAP. 189 



it is perennial, tapering, branched towards the bottom, and contains 

 a milky juice ; the stalks are numerous, slender, twining, and spread 

 themselves upon the ground, or neighbouring trees, to the extent 

 of fifteen or twenty feet ; the leaves are arrow-shaped, smooth, of 

 a bright green colour, and stand upon long footstalks : the flowers 

 are funnel-shaped, yellowish, plicated, and, according to Dr. Russel, 

 placed in pairs upon the pedicles : the calyx is double, consisting 

 of four emarginated leaflets in each row : the capsule is three and 

 sometimes four locular, containing seeds of a pyramidical shape. 

 No part of the dried plant possesses any medicinal quality but the 

 root, which Dr. Russel administered in decoction, and found it to 

 be a pleasant and mild cathartic. 



It is from the milky juice of the root that we obtain the officinal 

 Scammony, which is procured in the following manner by the pea- 

 sants, who collect it in the beginning of June : " Having cleared 

 away the earth from about the root, they cut off the top, in an 

 oblique direction, abont two inches below where the stalks spring 

 from it. Under the most depending part of the slope they fix a shell, 

 or some other convenient receptacle, into which the milky juice gra- 

 dually flows. It is left there about twelve hours, which time is suffi- 

 cient for draining off the whole juice: this, however, is in smalt 

 quantity, each root affording but a very few drams. This juice 

 from the several roots is put together, often into the leg of an old 

 boot, for want of some more proper vessel, where in a little time 

 it grows hard, and is the genuine Scammony ,'' This concrete h 

 a gummy-resin, generally of a light, shining, grey colour, and fria- 

 ble texture. It is brought from Aleppo and Smyrna ; that which 

 comes from the latter place is less valued than the former, and 

 is supposed to be more ponderous and of a deeper colour ; but the 

 colour affords no test of the goodness of this drug, which seems to 

 depend entirely upon the purity of the concrete. The smell of 

 Scammony is rather unpleasant, and the taste bitterish and slightly 

 acrid. The different proportions of gum and resin of which it 

 consists, have been variously stated, but as proof spirit is the best 

 menstruum for it, these substances are supposed to be nearly in 

 equal parts. 



Scammony appears to have been well known to the Greek and 

 Arabian physicians, and was not only employed internally as a pur- 

 gative, but also as an external remedy for tumours, scabies, tinea, 



